


Artist's Muse

by dinolaur



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-13
Updated: 2013-03-13
Packaged: 2017-12-05 04:52:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/719088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dinolaur/pseuds/dinolaur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>From the moment he first heard it, Grantaire has been transfixed by Enjolras's voice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Artist's Muse

**Author's Note:**

> I had a bad day yesterday and needed some fluff in my life. So here you go. I wrote this to go in the Vive La College series, but wasn't sure where to put it, so here it is on it's own.

From the moment he first heard it, Grantaire has been transfixed by Enjolras's voice. The tremor, the tone, it all cuts him down to his very soul. Grantaire is an artist, but he's also a notorious cynic who has a lot of problems seeing the beauty in anything. Yet, Enjolras's voice inspires him want to paint like nothing else ever has.  
  
It's a secret that he guards close. Not even Éponine knows, and she has an annoying tendency to drag almost all secrets from his lips.  
  
Art, along with being a little shit who likes to play the devil's advocate just to rile people up, is what he's good at, but it’s not something he particularly enjoys. It was just something he discovered he had talent in by accident as a child, and it was a simpler course of action in college than anything else. Not that Grantaire isn't capable of handling a more strenuous curriculum. He just doesn't fucking care to. Besides, if he had to bust his ass and study like the others did, well, either he wouldn't have time to enjoy his wine, or he would have drunk himself into the ground early on.  
  
He meets Enjolras in the spring semester of their freshman year, and he spends the entire summer drunk in his parents' pool house and trying to get that voice out of his head. He sits there and ignores the urge to get up and spend money on something other than liquor, something to attempt to create a visual representation of that intriguing voice.  
  
He's ready to smash his head into the wall by August. He's not supposed to be this person who waxes poetic and simpering love sonnets in his head. Oh, he can do all that prose bullshit with the best of them. He's more than sure that his ability to turn an argument around is solely what keeps Enjolras from leaving the room while they're still getting to know each other.  
  
The desire to create when he hears Enjolras's voice grows stronger over the years. It's one of the many reasons his liquor cabinet becomes liquor cabinets. He can't stand the idea of actually putting all these feelings to canvas, but after every impassioned speech from Enjolras, he's fighting the urge to go out and buy fine paints, not the shit he usually lifts from the studio, and just lose himself in it all.  
  
Enjolras is his muse, his accidental inspiration. He draws him often, doing his best to avoid full body sketches, focusing instead on hands and eyes. Enjolras is always so animated and powerful and passionate when he speaks of social change and justice, and so often Grantaire can't help but pull out his book from his otherwise empty bag—well, not entirely empty, he keeps a flask in there—map out the strong gestures and blazing eyes with charcoal.  
  
There's one moment in their junior year that Enjolras catches him sketching. Grantaire is lost in the lines. He doesn't always need to watch Enjolras when he draws him. He's spent countless hours memorizing his every feature. He feels that he could draw Enjolras with his eyes shut.  
  
"You're rather focused over here," says that angelic voice in his ear, and Grantaire so does not scream like a girl, no matter what Éponine and Courfeyrac laugh later.  
  
Grantaire tries to hide the page, clutching it to his chest. He plays off his surprise, hoping that it will distract Enjolras from the book. "Jesus fucking Christ," he cries. "You scared the shit out of me, man. Don't do that. You've got like freaky quiet elf feet or something."  
  
Enjolras, however, will not be so easily sidetracked. He just smiles that little half smile of his that on anyone else might be a blinding grin, and he reaches for the book. "Let me see?" It's a request, but to Grantaire it feels like a command, and he's powerless against such a thing from Enjolras.  
  
He can't even manage to put up a fight about it. He just sits there, unable to stop Enjolras from easing the book from his slackening grasp. The page is mostly hands, with a few sets of intense eyes, hair curling lightly over the brow. Enjolras studies the drawings with the same intensity that he would a monologue from some long dead philosopher.  
  
It's too much to hope for that he doesn't recognize his own features.  
  
"This is me," he says quietly, low enough that Courfeyrac three stools down can't overhear.  
  
Grantaire swallows thickly, trying to force down the lump in his throat. His mouth is dry, but he manages to mumble, "You're really expressive." He's sure his cheeks are burning.  
  
Enjolras looks up at him, and Grantaire can't breathe. His eyes are soft, and that little half smile seems like something different, something private, something that's maybe just for Grantaire. "They're very good," he praises, and Grantaire feels like he's being filled with sunshine.  
  
God damn, but he is pathetic.  
  
"Very, very good," Enjolras continues, his gaze falling back to the paper. "I hadn't realized you were this talented. You should share these. Are there more?"  
  
Grantaire's heart jumps into his throat as Enjolras reaches to flip the pages back. He must make a noise or startle involuntarily, because Enjolras looks up, brows tilted. "Unless you wish to keep them private," he says. "I'm sorry for prying."  
  
He looks disappointed, and Grantaire hurries to consider what all is in the book. It's a fairly new one, and he's about ninety-six percent positive there's nothing too incriminating in there. And he just wants that smile to come back, so he clears his throat and says, "No, go ahead. I just—go ahead."  
  
"You're sure," he asks, fingers hovering over the page. He's not, not really, but he nods, and Enjolras immediately flips to the beginning. Grantaire does his best to sit still while Enjolras carefully observes each page, almost sitting on his hands to keep from tapping fingers on his thigh or wringing them together.  
  
His heart flutters every time Enjolras smiles at a sketch, and it nearly leaps from his chest when Enjolras traces fingers lightly over a full page sketch of the bar with all their friends laughing. "Amazing," he breathes.  
  
"You can have it," Grantaire says without any input from his brain. Enjolras looks up, blinking wide eyes that make him look stupidly young. "Um, that is, if you wanted it," he adds, wishing the ground would open up and swallow him whole anytime now.  
  
"You'd give me this," Enjolras asks.  
  
Grantaire shrugs, trying to play it off as something trivial. "If you wanted," he mutters.  
  
"I'd love it," Enjolras answers, and that little upturn of his lips blossoms into a full blown smile. Yes, Enjolras is so very worthy of the nickname Apollo; he shines brighter than the sun.  
  
It's years later that Grantaire finally gives into that old urge to try to paint Enjolras's voice. They've graduated, or at least Grantaire has. Enjolras is still in school, finishing up a law degree. They live together, sharing a bed and their lives, and it's just a usual day. It's a Saturday, the one day if the week that Grantaire demands that Enjolras relax and only put his nose in a book if it’s for leisurely reading. Grantaire is in the kitchen, throwing a bit of anything and everything together to come up with dinner, sipping lightly at the first of his allotted two at-home drinks. He'll be allowed one more while they eat before Enjolras closes the bottle and puts it away for the night.  
  
Enjolras is in their bedroom, putting away folded clothes and collecting worn ones for the laundry. Grantaire barely hears it over the sizzling in the skillet, but there's a faint noise coming from the back of the apartment. He sets down the drink and goes to see what it is. As he walks down the hall, he realizes that it's singing. As he pokes his head around the door, he realizes that it's Enjolras singing.  
  
Grantaire is forced to grasp the doorframe to keep himself upright. If he had thought Enjolras's voice was enchanting before, no, this, this was a siren's song, completely enrapturing him and locking him forever under its spell.  
  
He's still standing there gaping when Enjolras turns around. "Jesus," he yelps, dropping the basket. "What's that you're always saying about me having freakish elf feet?"  
  
"You sing," Grantaire asks, eyes wide and completely unable to slow the racing of his heart.  
  
Enjolras blushes faintly. "I—yes, a bit," he answers.  
  
"A bit," Grantaire echoes incredulously. "A bit?"  
  
The blush deepens prettily. "You can sing too, R," he says.  
  
"Yeah, I'm a boss at karaoke," Grantaire says, "but that—holy shit. Enj, that was—that was beautiful." He pushes off the doorframe and takes four large steps that put him flush up against Enjolras. He takes his face in his hands, pulling him close for a sound kiss. Enjolras melts into it, his hands sliding around Grantaire's waist and up his back under his shirt.  
  
"Have you never heard me sing before," he asks a moment later, his forehead dipping to rest against Grantaire's shoulder.  
  
"Almost ten years I've known you and no, you have never so much as hummed in front of me," Grantaire says. "And I'm serious about this. Next karaoke night, we are doing a duet, and we are going to dominate. Cosette and Pontmercy can suck it."  
  
Enjolras smiles against Grantaire's neck, and he pulls him in tighter. They stand there for some moments before Enjolras says, "I smell burning."  
  
"Fuck," Grantaire shouts, jumping away and running to try to salvage their dinner.  
  
He ends up having to call in a pizza.  
  
Monday he comes home from work with two large bags full of brushes, canvas, and paints from a stupidly pretentious art store on the other side of town, but the place has the best quality stuff, and he's not about to use anything cheap for this.  
  
"Paints," Enjolras questions, glancing up from his mass highlighting of some civil rights case.  
  
"Okay, this is going to sound lame," Grantaire says, setting up an easel and cursing at the thing under his breath, "but can you just sing for a while?"  
  
"Sing," Enjolras repeats slowly.  
  
"Yeah," Grantaire says, willing his cheeks not to flush. "I mean, it can be whatever case you're reading or the fucking alphabet, but can you?"  
  
Enjolras shoots him a look of amused befuddlement, but he picks up his book and starts singing the passages. The tune changes numerous times, and really the whole thing sort of sounds ridiculous, but this is Enjolras and Grantaire, and Grantaire is transfixed.  
  
Enjolras smiles at him, and he picks up a brush.  
  
Enjolras stands behind him as they view the finished product, his chin propped on Grantaire's shoulder and arms around his waist. It's a burst of colors, and Grantaire can spot every portion of the canvas where Enjolras's voice had changed tempo, where he had sang softly—the colors swirl soft and light—or when he had become caught up in the passage—bold and hard lines that screamed of power.  
  
He snorts at it.  
  
"You don't like it," Enjolras asks.  
  
Grantaire just makes an immature noise. Enjolras laughs. "Well, I think it's fantastic. I'm putting it up on the wall, where that tapestry thing is."  
  
Grantaire chortles. "Your mother gave us that," he says, and laughs again when Enjolras just lets out a hum of barely—read: not at all—contained disapproval. "And you've been looking for an excuse to take it down for three years."  
  
"And now I have a legitimate and utterly wonderful one," Enjolras says, kissing Grantaire's cheek. "Can I put it up now, or does it need to dry more?"  
  
Grantaire does several more paintings trying to capture the essence of Enjolras's voice over the years. Some he likes more than others, although none of them come close to doing that angelic sound justice. Enjolras praises all of them, actually gushing over some so much that Grantaire has no choice but to drag him into the bedroom, but Enjolras always has a soft spot for that first one, and it travels with him to all of the offices he inhabits over the years, hanging proudly on the wall where he can gaze up at it when he has to work long nights away from his lover.


End file.
